Gun charge expected in Newburgh standoff

Wednesday

Dec 12, 2012 at 2:00 AM

CITY OF NEWBURGH — Police Chief Michael Ferrara said Gosford "Biggs" Lembhard Jr. can expect to face an additional weapons charge, because he carried a gun into the final frantic moments of a 10-hour standoff.

DOYLE MURPHY

CITY OF NEWBURGH — Police Chief Michael Ferrara said Gosford "Biggs" Lembhard Jr. can expect to face an additional weapons charge, because he carried a gun into the final frantic moments of a 10-hour standoff.

Lembhard, 26, was arrested on Dec. 5 on charges that included attempted murder, attempted first-degree assault and gun possession. U.S. marshals had raided his mother's home minutes before 6 a.m. that day, but Lembhard barricaded himself into a back room with three relatives and his brother's girlfriend. He was finally arrested when he bolted out a first-floor window.

So far, the only charges against Lembhard are related to a September shooting. Police and prosecutors allege that he fired at a car occupied by a man, a woman and the woman's toddler. Additional charges have been expected as a result of the Dec. 5 standoff, and Ferrara told the Times Herald-Record they would include at least the new weapons charge.

"The charge is coming," Ferrara said. "It just hasn't been filed yet."

Once out the window, Lembhard scrambled onto the top railing of a neighbor's porch where Newburgh police Officer Robert Vasta yanked him to the floor as other law enforcement officers swarmed in. The scene played out in front of journalists and Lembhard's relatives. Most observers, however, never noticed the cloth-wrapped object Lembhard carried in his left hand. Ferrara said it was an unloaded, .45-caliber handgun.

"Why he carried it, I don't understand," Ferrara said.

In a speaker phone conversation with reporters on Dec. 5, Lembhard said he was scared police would kill him if he walked out. Lembhard's brother, 22-year-old Michael Lembhard, was shot dead by police in March during a confrontation. The officers involved were later cleared by a grand jury, but that has done nothing to persuade family members the shooting was necessary. Lembhard's attorney, Michael Sussman, said the family really believes Michael Lembhard was assassinated and that cops have harassed and tried to discredit them with arrests and charges ever since.

Once someone thinks they're being targeted, Sussman said, they don't trust anyone. He spent more than three hours during the standoff inside the house, trying to talk Lembhard into a peaceful surrender. He was joined for a time by Lembhard's mother, Arlene Lembhard, who also couldn't convince her son he would be safe if he walked out. Sussman said he didn't know that day whether Lembhard was armed on the other side of the door, and he doesn't know why he would have carried an unloaded gun out the window into the midst of heavily armed law enforcement agents.

"Is there a death wish involved?" Sussman said. "I think part of what he believed is this was the day he was going to die."

Lembhard is being held in Orange County Jail on $500,000 cash bail or $1 million bond. Sussman has filed a motion asking for "reasonable" bail.